in use

Questions about in use

What does in use mean?

in use means "(of facilities such as telephones or lavatories) unavailable for use by anyone else or indicating unavailability; (`engaged' is a British term for a busy telephone line)". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for in use?

Close synonyms include busy, engaged. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is in use a common word?

in use is banded "Familiar" — widely understood, used when the subject calls for it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.